Deformed Martian craters
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on September 3, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The focus of the image for the MRO science team were the wedding cake layers inside the largest crater. These layers suggest glacial ice, with the layers suggesting multiple cycles of glacial ebb and flow. Since the crater is at 43 degrees north latitude, and sits in the chaos region dubbed Protonilus Mensae, smack dab in the center of what I call Mars’ glacier country, this conclusion makes perfect sense.
To my eye, however, the most interesting feature of this photo are the many distorted craters. The overview map below shows the picture’s location, as well as several nearby very large impact craters which might have caused many secondary impacts, including the many craters at this location.
The red dot marks the location of today’s cool image. The three mensae regions cover most of Mars’ northern glacier country.
Why are the craters distorted? Research has shown that even at impact they would have been circular, even if the impact has been an oblique one.
My guess is that the solution lies underground, which at this location probably has a somewhat thick near-surface ice layer. When the impact occurred, much of the ejecta that formed the crater rim’s was probably frozen ice. The heat of impact would have vaporized a great deal of that ice, but enough would have simply melted and then quickly refroze. In that melt-freeze process it is very likely that the crater rims would have ended up distorted.
Furthermore, later impacts on top of older craters would have distorted those older craters further, as it appears happened to the craters to the east of the largest. In the overview map the large craters to the west, 147-mile wide Lyot Crater and 86-mile-wide Moreux Crater, would have produced many secondaries at two different times, thus resulting in the overlay and melted effect seen here.
Readers!
Every February I run a fund-raising drive during my birthday month. This year I celebrate my 72nd birthday, and hope and plan to continue writing and posting on Behind the Black for as long as I am able.
I hope my readers will support this effort. As I did in my November fund-raising drive, I am offering autographed copies of my books for large donations. Donate $250 and you can have a choice of the hardback of either Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8 or Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space. Donate $200 and you can get an autographed paperback copy of either.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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P.O.Box 1262
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on September 3, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The focus of the image for the MRO science team were the wedding cake layers inside the largest crater. These layers suggest glacial ice, with the layers suggesting multiple cycles of glacial ebb and flow. Since the crater is at 43 degrees north latitude, and sits in the chaos region dubbed Protonilus Mensae, smack dab in the center of what I call Mars’ glacier country, this conclusion makes perfect sense.
To my eye, however, the most interesting feature of this photo are the many distorted craters. The overview map below shows the picture’s location, as well as several nearby very large impact craters which might have caused many secondary impacts, including the many craters at this location.
The red dot marks the location of today’s cool image. The three mensae regions cover most of Mars’ northern glacier country.
Why are the craters distorted? Research has shown that even at impact they would have been circular, even if the impact has been an oblique one.
My guess is that the solution lies underground, which at this location probably has a somewhat thick near-surface ice layer. When the impact occurred, much of the ejecta that formed the crater rim’s was probably frozen ice. The heat of impact would have vaporized a great deal of that ice, but enough would have simply melted and then quickly refroze. In that melt-freeze process it is very likely that the crater rims would have ended up distorted.
Furthermore, later impacts on top of older craters would have distorted those older craters further, as it appears happened to the craters to the east of the largest. In the overview map the large craters to the west, 147-mile wide Lyot Crater and 86-mile-wide Moreux Crater, would have produced many secondaries at two different times, thus resulting in the overlay and melted effect seen here.
Readers!
Every February I run a fund-raising drive during my birthday month. This year I celebrate my 72nd birthday, and hope and plan to continue writing and posting on Behind the Black for as long as I am able.
I hope my readers will support this effort. As I did in my November fund-raising drive, I am offering autographed copies of my books for large donations. Donate $250 and you can have a choice of the hardback of either Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8 or Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space. Donate $200 and you can get an autographed paperback copy of either.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Nothing constructive to add, just wanted to say that I love these pictures – so different from Lunar craters.